! Words Mean - What They Do Poem by Michael Shepherd

We throw them to the winds;
like water from a shower;
what wind? what shower? and who throws them to whom?

In 1996, John Bargh, with scrupulous research,
found that, hearing words about the elderly –
even when flashed subliminally on the screen –
makes us walk more slowly…you kidding? No…

and in 1998, Dijksterhuis and Van Knippenberg
showed that if we hear words about ‘professors’
we’re smarter playing Trivial Pursuits;

while hearing words about sports hooligans
makes us dumber…

and this without referring to the images and sounds
of crime, guns, killing, and computer games…
ah well, we identify with those glamorous criminals
and then are shown that justice always prevails –
er, doesn’t it? …but what of those satisfying PC games
where, zap! we always gun them down…
oh, it’s all harmless play; like Shakespeare’s gods,
‘we kill them for our sport’…

words mean what they do;
science has warned us when all else has failed.
Good mortals all, be of fine heart, and hale…